Off the back of a 4-1 defeat to Newcastle, with the Carling Cup already on the shelf and only two away wins in the league all season, few fancied their chances at Ewood Park.

But Tottenham, without Paul Robinson because of an ankle injury, took an early lead through Dimitar Berbatov, who could have added another two, as the visitors ran rings around a Blackburn team who desperately needed a victory to boost their chances of a Uefa Cup place.

Rovers pride themselves on their work-rate and the purpose of their play, but for 30 minutes they could only watch as the likes of Steed Malbranque and Jermaine Jenas played the ball around them. But, for no apparent reason, all that changed when Pascal Chimbonda tried to intercept Steven Reid's cross-field pass that he was never going to reach, allowing David Bentley to cut in from the right and pick out Morten Gamst Pedersen to equalise.

For the remaining hour, Tottenham were a different team and there was next to no quality but plenty of finger-pointing from Berbatov, who once again demonstrated his love for a bit of drama with plenty of gesticulation, one bout of which led to his captain, Robbie Keane, running 15 yards to shake a fist at his strike-partner as play went on around them.

Through a translator, Ramos's explanation of his team's performance did not run too deep. He said: "We weren't being assertive enough in the final third. We were in front of goal on a number of occasions with some real opportunities and we just needed to be a little bit more decisive."

The rest of the match was a scrap, although Brad Friedel pulled off fine saves from Berbatov and Malbranque just after the restart and Blackburn felt they should have had a penalty when Bentley ran into Gilberto on the edge of the area with nine minutes left.

Bentley made less than a pace before colliding with the Brazilian, but the Rovers manager, Mark Hughes, whose side dropped below Aston Villa in the race for seventh place, said: "It was a penalty. David burst forward with real purpose and the guy stood in front of him and actually moved his leg to make sure David went down and at the minimum it was obstruction. We thought it was a penalty and we're a little bit disappointed with that."

Best moment: The passing and movement to open up Blackburn for the opening goal was particularly impressive and typical of Tottenham’s start.

Worst moment: Berbatov’s quality is not in question but once again he showed his temperament is in doubt with series of strops.